That mystery house on Beech Road ........

Now number 121 Beech Road vanished a long time ago.

Hunts Croft, circa, 1960s

It was one of our more elegant early 19th century properties which was set back from Beech Road, and went sometime in the 1970s.

For a long time after its demolition the land was left an open space, with the occasional suggestion that it could be a car park, a project which came to nought when the Corporation and the local traders couldn’t agree on a funding package.

There will be a few people who remember it, but sadly I am not one of them, which means it had gone before I arrived in 1976 or like so many things I was just not that observant back then.

Either way, there is little to mark its presence, save an entry in the tithe schedule for 1845, the Rate books and official maps.

If I have this right, it was Hunt Croft House and in 1845 was the residence of Thomas White who rented it from the Lloyd Estate.

With a lot of digging it will be possible to track its history through the 19th century till its demolition. I know that in 1969 it was occupied by a Frances. J Casse, and in 1911 by Mr and Mrs Chester, their five children, and a boarder.

Looking into the garden, circa 1970s

The house had nine rooms with a biggish garden at the front, ending in a tallish stone wall which ran along Beech Road.

Back in the mid 19th century it looked at on fields.  From the rear Mr White could look out on a field and orchard, while from his front windows he could gaze across to Row Acre, which stretched up to High Lane.

But by the 20th century the fields had all gone, and on either side of this fine old house were shops.

Beech Road, circa 1970s

And here I must admit my mistake, because for years I had mistaken Croft House for Joel View which stood a little further down the road and had been built in 1859.

Many will remember Joel View as the property owned by J Johnny, which I assumed had been built much later.

I even compounded the mistake by arguing that the stone tablet which carried the  name of Joel View had been salvaged from Mr White’s former home and been added to J. Johnny’s.

Dating the picture

Now, even then I knew that this was pushing it, because our own historian Thomas Ellwood had written that Joel View was one of the new developments in the township at the end of the 1850s.

All of which goes to show that sometimes when it is easy to ignore the obvious and create an elaborate theory which is built on sand and that is really just a lead in to two pictures of Hunt’s Croft sent to me by Roger Shelley who took them sometime in the 1970s and which had lain in his negative box until yesterday.

The two images compliment an earlier one taken by N. Fife for which I don’t have a date for, but maybe from the 1960s.

That said it might be possible to date Roger’s pictures, from the shop which is up for sale.  This had been Mr Westwell’s fruit and greengrocer shop in 1969, but sometime in the next decade became The Village Wholefood Shop.

Hunt's Croft demolished, circa 1979-early 1980s

It was still trading when I took a picture around 1979, showing the shop and the site which had once been Hunts Croft.

So that is it for now, although I am hoping Roger has more pictures.

Location; Chorlton



Pictures; Hunts Croft circa 1960s, courtesy of N Fife, the Lloyd Collection and again circa 1970s from the collection of Roger Shelley, and after it had been demolished circa 1979, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The lost Eltham & Woolwich pictures ...... no. 33 ..... building the barrier

Now for many the Thames Barrier will just be one of those bits of river furniture, but for those of us who remember it being built, it was a fascinating engineering project, and this is the first of a few pictures taken during its construction.

For four decades it was one of the photographs I took of Eltham and Woolwich in the mid ‘70’s which sat undisturbed in our cellar.

But all good things eventually come to light.

They were colour slides which have been transferred electronically.

The quality of the original lighting and the sharpness is sometimes iffy, but they are a record of a lost Eltham and Woolwich.

Location; Woolwich

Picture; Woolwich circa 1976, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Snapshots ……….. meeting out justice in 1854

Now the story as reported was not unusual, and consisted of a rather nasty opportune assault and theft in a public place.*

The crime, May 10th 1854

Pick any newspaper for any decade, and there are a depressing long list of similar crimes, which in the 19th century were usually dealt with in a harsh way.

All of which meant that I didn’t give much thought to the story of the young woman, who was assaulted and robbed by two young men in the May of 1854.

But I was drawn back partly because I felt ashamed at dismissing what was obviously an awful experience, partly because the woman was on her way to Chorlton-cum-Hardy and finally out of curiosity at the fate of the two who committed the crime.

The newspaper account ended with the committal of the two, to the sessions at Preston

And that would have been that, but for the simple inclusion of the names of the thieves, which in turn led to the discovery of the sentencing of the two.

The sentence, May 22nd 1854

The crime had taken place on the Saturday, the two were committed on the Monday, and on Monday May 22nd they were up in front of the magistrates and were charged with “Larceny from the Person” and sentenced to “4 months” with “1 week in Solitary Confinement and once whipped”.

During the sessions, the magistrates saw 155, cases, most were for different gradations of larceny, with a few for obtaining money or goods under false pretences, three for counterfeiting silver coins, and five for Riot.

The longest sentence was for 2 years, with most being given between three and four months incarceration.

In the case of William Barlow and Robert McMillan, both got four months in prison, with a week in solitary and both were whipped.

This marks them out from the other larceny cases and might reflect the nature of their crime, but we don’t have any details of what the magistrates said.

But the five committed for Riot were acquitted.

Sadly, so far I have been able to track what happened to our two after their appearance, and nor do we have a name for the young woman.

Location; Manchester

*Highway Robbery, Manchester Guardian May 10th, 1854

When Gas was glamorous ............ in the show rooms of the South Metropolitan Gas Company at 36 Powis Street

Now the gas cooker, the central heating and the gas fired water boiler are pretty much taken for granted by most people.

Even given the ever increasing price of the stuff many of us will just get with using it, thankful that barring an accident the systems will come on at the push of a button or turn of the tap.

Most appliances are fairly utilitarian come in a number of shades of white and just do the business.

But back in the late 19th and early twentieth century’s gas could still be glamorous and it was the fuel of the future.

Read any of the handouts from the municipally controlled gas boards and you enter a world of cheap clean and safe living whether it be lighting the home or feeding the family.

Manchester Corporation both sold and rented gas cookers and in time did the same for electricity offering also very competitive rates for wring old houses.

All of which takes me to the show rooms of the South Metropolitan Gas Company at 36 Powis Street in Woolwich.

The South Metropolitan Gas Company was founded in 1829 and began an ambition programme of building gasworks at Vauxhall, Bankside and Thames St, Greenwich. These were extended by mergers with other companies, and bring me nicely back to the show rooms.*

The provision of gas along with its appliances was big money and to win over customers the show rooms had to look the part.

So I shall leave you with these scenes, all from postcards produced by Tuck & Sons in a series titled London, South Metropolitan Gas Company.

Now there is a piece of hard sell which can’t be bettered.

And just to doubly remind you of all the wonders of the place each picture post card had the times of opening on the back.

I think even I would have been impressed.

Pictures; from Tuck & Sons in a series titled London, South Metropolitan Gas Company, courtesy of Tuck DB, http://tuckdb.org/

*The National Archives, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/a2a/records.aspx?cat=1866-sesom&cid=0#0

A bridge, a missing street……. and Mr. Samuel Moore ....... baker in residence for over half a century

Now it began with a request for information about a plaque on the wall of the Boardman Street Bridge, and quickly became something else.

The plaque commemorates the building of the bridge over the River Medlock in that area between London Road and Fairfield Street, and is a reminder that once the river marked the boundary between Manchester and Chorlton Upon Medlock.

That in itself is  a fascinating story and drew me into research on Boardman Street, which today is pretty much an uninspiring bit of road which runs from Fairfield Street twisting  and turning on itself till it joins London Road.

Some time in the past it exchanged its historic name of Boardman Street and became Baring Street and gained a bridge.

The bridge and the original plaque were built after 1851 and before that the road stopped at the river where it joined Buxton Street.

I have yet to find out when the bridge was built but it was there by 1894, while the original line of Boardman Street was by the 1840s a mix of back to back properties some larger houses, a pub and a sprinkling of industrial units.

And so far it has yet to yield anything more.  It doesn’t appear in the early street directories, which in turn means I can’t find any names of lived there and that in turn hampers a search for the census returns for the street.

So as you do I turned to Buxton Street, which is in the Directory for 1851 and offered up a series of names for residents along its stretch from London Road past Boardman Street.

But none of those names can be found in the census records for that year, and after a long trawl of the existing enumerator districts, I could only turn up half of Buxton Street for 1861.

They will be there, it will just take more time to find them, and in particular to locate a Mr. Samuel Moore who was photographed outside his baker’s shop in 1895.  

He looks to be quite elderly, and so he should given that he first appears in the Rate Books in 1847 on Buxton Street renting a house and shop from a J. Campton.

And there he still is fifty-three years later.

So, I will continue to go looking for him in the census records, and when I do , I will be able to discover more about his life, that of his neighbours and the photographs of the houses from 1895.

But in the way these things work, someone will come up with the details, and that is the fun of it.

Location; Manchester

Pictures;  Mr. Samuel Moore, 6, Buxton Street, 1895, m00653, 3, 5 Buxton Street, 1895, H. Entwhistle, Plaque, Boardman Street, 1971, Ann Jackson, m11046, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, Buxton Street in 1851, from Adshead map of Manchester 1851, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Buxton Street was in the London Road Registration District, but the rest of it may be in Aedwick, we shall see 

Shopping in Chorlton at Adsega …… which became Tesco and Hanbury’s ……. Supermarkets I have known

Now, I have to admit I never shopped at Adsega in Chorlton, but friends did and have told me so.

Marion Jackson was the first telling me “When Adsega/Tesco opened at Chorlton office my mother carefully obeyed the sign telling her to take a basket. We had it for years!”,

Which was followed by Craig who commented “People don't believe me when I say there was a Supermarket called Adsega. Thank you!!”, and David who added “Remember my mother shopped there when I was young, when she mentioned Adsega some thought she meant Asda".

So, that set me going and the first port of call was Company House, from which I discovered that Adsega was registered in 1959, “to carry on business as wholesale and retail grocers” as well as "producers, manufacturers and importers” of a variety of food". *

It had a short life and its 47 stores were acquired by Tesco in 1965, which I guess was when its shop in the former cinema on Barlow Moor Road became part of the new retail empire before the building was sold on to, Hanbury’s.**

At present I don’t have a picture of the Chorlton Adsega, but I bet someone has a photograph of the shop on Barlow Moor Road, or maybe even other bits of ephemera, from shopping bags, receipts a loyalty card.

In the meantime, I like the way, a little bit of our forgotten past as come out of the shadows.

And it follows on from an earlier story about self service stores in Chorlton, which included the comment that the book on the arrival of supermarkets and how they were greeted has yet to be written.

So, thank you to Marion Jackson,  Craig Henderson and David Wilson with the expectation that this is just the beginning.

Location; Chorlton

Picture; the former cinema on Barlow Moor Road which became an Adsega, m09248, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass


*Adsega, 

** How Many Companies Does Tesco Own?


*** A Chorlton revolution ……….. the self-service shop

A synagogue ......Mr. & Mrs. Solomon ....... and Manchester's Corporation Street

So long before the construction of motorways and airports wiped out some of our favourite buildings  there was Corporation Street. 

The synagogue on Halliwell Street, 1849

It runs from Cross Street and was cut in the late 1840s, and like all such major developments resulted in the demolition of buildings and the loss of smaller streets.

One of those buildings was the synagogue on Halliwell Street which had opened in 1825.

The inaugural stone had been laid the year before at a ceremony which had started with prayers at the “temporary place of worship on Long Millgate  …. [after which] the reader and congregation walked in procession to Halliwell Street to perform the laying of the first stone of the intended new synagogue when very appropriate and impressive prayers, composed for the occasion were said by the reader, after which thirty persons sat down, at the Wilton Arms to an excellent dinner”.*

Just over a year later in the September the Manchester Guardian reported on the consecration of the new synagogue which it wrote “is in every respect suitable for the performance of divine worship”. *****

It was according to one observer an unpretenious red brick building which replaced a temporary place of worship which had been in Ainsworth Court off Long Millgate.

Access to the Court was through a narrow passage.

Sadly the Manchester Guardian didn’t comment on its closure or demolition but did give a detailed account of the new synagogue on Park Street Cheetham Hill Road on March 25th 1858.**

Halliwell Street on which the early synagogue was built was swept away with the coming of Corporation Street, but the 1851 census provides us with a very clear picture of its inhabitants, including Soloman Philips who was the appointed overseer for the synagogue, along with a Miss Levy who described herself as a Professor of Hebrew.

In all there were seventy four residents living on the street, twenty-one of whom were children under the age of 14. The seventy four had  birth places which ranged from Manchester and Salford to Liverpool, Warsaw and Hamburg. 

Their occupations were varied but erred on the side of skilled artisan, including watchmaker and milliner to a professor of Music and a veterinary surgeon alongside the more humble jobs of launderess, matchmaker and traveller along with the delightful “Ender and Mender”.

Mr. Philips had come from Warsaw, and his wife Sarah from Koosemer in Poland  No pictures have survived of their home on Halliwell Street but it commanded an annual rent of £18  which translated into a weekly rent of six shillings which was above that of properties in the surrounding streets.

And it does appear that their house survived the destruction of the synagogue and part of the road it stood on because in 1861 Philip and Sarah are still here at number 9, which sometime during the decade before had been renumbered as no. 4.

Now that remanent is part of Balloon Street which has also been much truncated, but as Balloon Street it is a reminder of that 18th century pioneer of all things ballons.  

This was James Sadler who according to my Annals of Manchester "ascended in his balloon on May 12th 1785 from a garden behind the Manchester Arms Inn Long Millgate, which was then a private house”***. 

And not content with that seven days later “made his second balloon ascent, but on alighting was obliged to let it drive in the wind”.

Indigo Hotel, Todd Street, 2025

Leaving me just to say that there is a plaque commemorating the synagogue on the wall of the Indigo Hotel on Todd Street, close to where the synagogue stood. The text says, "Manchester's First Synagogue, 1825-1858 stood near this site until its demolition in the construction of Corporation Street".

Location; Shudehill

 Picture; the OS map of Manchester & Salford, 1844-49, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/ and Indigo Hotel, 2025, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*The Manchester Guardian, August 14th, 1824

** The Manchester Guardian, September 10th, 1825

***The Manchester Guardian, March 26th, 1858

****Axon, William, The Annals of Manchester, 1885

***** Davies, Ethan, Manchester's first synagogue recognised with plaque in special ceremony, Manchester Evening News, July 13th, 2022, https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/manchesters-first-synagogue-recognised-plaque-24477558